Vostu Acquires MP Game Studio, Could Be Getting Into Licensed Games

Brazilian social game developer Vostu announced the acquisition of MP Game Studio and plans to consummate the deal with a new online game due out this month.

To date, MP Game Studio specializes in developing games for licensed intellectual property. Some of its partners named in the press release announcing the acquisition include Nickelodeon, Cartoon Network, TNT, Coca-Cola, Microsoft, Unilever, National Geographic, Clarin Group, and Miniclip. Its highest-profile games include two Ben 10 titles, two SpongeBob SquarePants titles, an Avatar: The Last Airbender game, and a mash-up fighting game that combines several Nickelodeon characters.

This acquisition could put Vostu in a more favorable position for developing licensed games. Up until now, the developer has produced one soccer title and a handful of games that come close enough to cloning Zynga’s FarmVille, Cafe World, CityVille, and Texas HoldEm Poker as to provoke lawsuits. By working with licensed IP, Vostu could shield itself from legal drama while leveraging a preexisting fan base to drive growth in its games.

Vostu’s primary audience is based in Latin America where its games run on a proprietary platform in addition to Orkut, Facebook, and MSN. According to COO Matias Recchia, the company has an audience of 42 million registered users; our AppData traffic tracking service shows 2.7 million monthly active users across all Vostu games available on Facebook.